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Editors' Review

Opera Mini looks like your average iPhone Web browser, but it's the details behind the scenes that may have it replacing the default Safari browser on your iPhone.

Unlike Safari and other iPhone browsers created using the WebKit standard, Opera Mini 5 for iPhone is what's called a proxy browser. It sends Web page requests to Opera's servers, which then compress the Web page before sending it back to the phone, resulting in an often faster way to distribute Web content.

Like Opera Mini on other mobile platforms, the browser sports an attractive, icon-rich dark theme. The home page features "Speed Dial," a feature that lets you choose nine quick links for getting to favorite sites. As with Safari, tabbed browsing is on board, but Opera adds a splash of style with the tab bar that lets you easily slide your finger over thumbnail images to swap tabs.

Other useful features include a password manager, find-in-page, and bookmarks you can sync--along with your Speed Dial and typed browser history--with Opera on your desktop. You can also view saved pages, select text, save images, and download. Unlike Opera Mini on other mobile platforms, the iPhone version picks up where you left off from a previous session.

Though there's much to like (the speed in particular--it often blows the pants off Safari), Opera Mini for iPhone lacks multitouch support; there's no pinch-and-zoom, but you can zoom in and out by touching your finger to the screen. Since it's a proxy rather than fully functional Web browser, it doesn't recognize Wi-Fi sign-in screens. We had to open Safari to authenticate before using Opera Mini. We'd like to be able to copy hyperlinks (not just open them in new tabs), and we'll add on our usual complaint about the separate search and address bars. Overall, however, Opera Mini's browser experience is a welcome alternative, and one we'd readily recommend to most iPhone users.

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Publisher's Description

Compress data by up to 90% before sending it to your iPhone, so page-loads are lightning fast. Opera Mini is a breeze to use, and can synchronize data between your phone and computer. Speed Dial gets you to your favorite Web sites with a single tap. An address field with auto-completion means you type less. Tabs allow for multitasking with several Web pages. Bookmarks can be easily managed and accessed.

Opera for the iPhone delivers speed. It gives a few pros over the defualt Safari browser but is lacking video support and multi-touch, which other browsers on the iPhone most have. Can't wait to see whats on the next update of Opera Mini.

I can see there is an emerging consensus here, that this browser is a worthless piece of software. Please let me add my signature!

First, this Opera Mini does not feel any faster than Safari (3G or WiFi). Second, it (almost) never displays Web pages correctly; most are rendered as a mess. Third, I just can't figure out how to operate the darn thing. I want to scroll - it zooms in, I want to hit a link - it zooms out, and so on and so forth...

Opera Mini is said to come preloaded on many cell phones. Poor fellas (ones using those phones to browse the Web)!

The zoom functionality isn't nearly as intuitive as Safari so it feels like a step back. Viewing web pages in Opera Mini isn't very fluid. Browser feels very clunky.

Summary

If you're anti-Safari and want a good browser, this may be your best choice; but if you're used to the way Safari works and are excited about a faster browser, actually using the browser itself may slow you down. I kept it as a backup browser, but I'm not sure when I would use it.. oh and I should also note, I'm running 4.0 beta, so that could possibly have an effect on Opera's performance.

The tab interface is nice as is the bookmark dialer, competition is a good thing, theoretically faster in EDGE

Cons

Rendering is inconsistent, no full javascript support, poor quality text, no multitouch

Summary

I live and work in the city and we have good 3G coverage pretty much every where I go with 3G I just do not notice any speed improvement using Opera vs Safari so that plus is really a non-factor for me. So, Opera would need to win out over Safari in terms of pure features to become my browser of choice and it simply doesn't foot the bill. There are some nice things I would love to see get pulled into Safari, the tab interface is much nicer than what is used by Safari and comes much closer to replicating the tab experience on a full blown browser. The dialer is also a nice feature the only real comparison in Safari would be bookmarks sent to the home screen. That being said Opera trips up when it comes to the job of actually rendering pages which is after all what the thing is for. It handles mobile formatted pages fine, but any page designed for a full browser looses some functionality. The loss of pinch and zoom especially is huge as you loose the fine grain control over zoom you get in Safari. Once you add in the poor text rendering I guess the pinch and zoom exclusion doesn't matter so much since the rendering of text is so poor you can only really read it on pretty high zoom levels anyway so the tap and zoom close ends up being the "best" option. The lack of javascript also hurts though I guess Apple and their licensing share some of the blame for this one (do other versions of mobile opera support javascript?).

So final thoughts not a horrible first try, but too many areas were Safari comes out on top, if I lived in an area with poor 3G coverage the scales might tip in a different direction, but for me it is just not good enough.

I've been using this on my iPod Touch for a while now, and have been amazed my how much faster this is over safari. I don't know if the same results are on the iPhone over 3G or Edge, but over wifi there is a significant speed increase. But every time i want to stream a BOL, it opens safari to do it there, which i think should be fixed, and also, the pinch and zoom is very extreme. Just a little tiny pinch zooms in way too much.

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